


bet you crawl; all alone

by Theboys



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Dark, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Psychological Horror, Sam Winchester's Demonic Powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-10
Updated: 2016-06-06
Packaged: 2018-05-19 13:36:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5969122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theboys/pseuds/Theboys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sammy, age five, dark-hungry and growing; you find him shoving scraps of paper in his mouth in the bathroom; he locked the door because even then he was smart enough to not want you looking.</p><p>Dean begins to hear the Sound when he's seven; he doesn't know yet that there will be no end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [silver9mm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/silver9mm/gifts).



> Okay, the tags make this look really, really bad (but I promise; it's not terrible)!
> 
> Title taken from The Crawl, by Childish Gambino.
> 
> Also, amazing thanks to trendykitty for making me think that this WASN'T a natural disaster; all of these words belong to her.

You hear it for the first time when you are seven, and it stuns you into stillness. Sammy’s curled up on his side next to you and you count his heartbeats in groups of three (this year it is a trio but it will be four in May and then five the following year).

Dad is in the kitchen, nail-gun clink of an open beer bottle; you know what the liquid sounds like, sloshed up against the cage of glass, and it soothes you.

It’s a whisper at the precipice of your mind and you can only feel the phantom of what it once was; it’s disorientation at its finest.

Sammy’s mouth hangs wine-dark and low in sleep.

-

Dean’s face gets him into more trouble than any monster Dad’s let him hunt so far, and Dean doesn’t understand it, or can’t.

He’s hovering on the edge of sixth grade, legs sprawled grown man-wide against the unforgiving plastic chair.

The principal’s office is the same in every district, impersonal and cold, and Dean thinks it’s a shitty fear tactic.

His knee jounces uncontrollably; Sammy gets out in 12 minutes (a six and his brother) and he’ll panic if Dean’s even a second late.

Dean pulls his hands into one another, scratches at the webbing between his fingers with one dull nail. They’re buffed clean; Dean hates dirt; the casual-loose lounge of soil under his clothes and skin.

He’s supposed to wait for Dad here, but Dad’s not coming; he’s around five states over trying to figure out why a Church Grim keeps materializing on the second Sunday of each month.

Dean’s been here for ten minutes; he’s _trying_ to follow the goddamned rules, but he’s never learned how to cut his losses.

Why’s he gotta be the one to stand down if he’s right? Dean runs his thumb along the swollen skin of his lower lip, thinks back in disgust to Mr. Carter and the marrow-pale of his hands.

They were colder than they should be; it’s only August.

Dean rocks forward once, spreading his palms so that they stretch over his kneecaps. He can hear the water-drip of seconds coming from the clock hanging in the corner of the office, black and silver against middle-aged cream.

Ten sets of sixes in a minute and 30 sets of six have already gone by and Dean’s not about this.

He catches his backpack up in his arms and doesn’t bother shoving it across one shoulder.

Principal Stern’s assistant won’t be here; she left after two six-sets and she’ll be gone before her shift ends because she’s got two kids to pick up from the high school across town and that’s a necessity.

Dean’s only gotta travel to the other side of the school because Sammy’s with the other kindergarteners, and they’re always closest to the exit.

He scuffs his Chucks against the bricks, same way as he does every time he rounds the one sharp corner on the way to Sammy’s class.

Dean’s breathing heavy and no one pays him any mind; Dean Winchester always leaves class early to grab his kid brother.

Dean’s sucks his ruin of a lip into his mouth and shoves his hands way far down into Dad’s old bomber jacket, collects excess fabric in between the sand-drag of his fingertips.

Sammy’s the first out, just the way Dean taught him; know what’s to your back so you can focus on your front.

Dean squints at the kid, can’t help but to compare the pressed-clean stitch of the other children, carnival-bright superhero backpacks and lunchboxes with artificial ice-packs.

Sammy’s got one black sock on and another one that Dean thinks might’ve been white once upon a time, but now just looks dark grey. It hurts when Dean gnaws on his lip but he can’t quell habit.

Dad wants Sammy’s hair shorn as dull as Dean’s but Dean can’t bring himself to hack off the flightless strands, strip Sammy even further; make him naked.

His boy’s face is grim, old-man haggard, and Sammy moves with an unconscious grace; none of the kids rushing past Sam clip his body on the race to the carpool line.

Sammy finally turns in his direction, both small hands tangled in the straps of his Jansport. Sammy picked it himself. It’s night-blue, darkest they could find even though Sammy asked for black, scoured Wal-Mart until Dean took him by hand in exasperation.

“Bean!” Sammy cries, and he looks six years old right then; so brilliant that Dean stumbles over himself in regret. He can’t keep the kid like that always, and Dean holds out a hand. Sammy runs closer, uncharacteristic stumble into Dean’s arms.

“Heya Sammy,” Dean whispers into Sam’s hair, and his brother tilts his head back to reach Dean’s eyes. Sammy has Lucy eyes, tangled up with the sky, and they narrow in concern when they take in Dean’s countenance.

Dean flushes under the scrutiny, and he disengages from Sam’s grip, grabs Sam’s dry palm in his own and shoves the collective of their fingers into Dad’s pocket.

“You ready, kid?” Dean asks, and Sammy’s fingers tighten to the point of pain.

-

You don’t know that you’ll hear it again in a few days, that it’ll be loud and cacophonous and you won’t have a sphere of reference for it.

It’s brief enough that you’ll almost miss it, but the tendril of the sound is unlike anything you’ve ever experienced before.

It’s foreign enough that you’ll accept it for years as a non-nothing; the product of something that should never be.

-

Dean’s favorite number is thirteen; it’s harder than before; the odd ones always are.

Sammy’s a tense line behind him, and Dean can count every single labored breath as Sam holds himself taut against the onslaught of rage Dean knows the kid feels.

“Nightmare, Sam,” Dad’s saying, weary in that rotting-corpse way that John wears like a shroud.

“You’re smart, you tell me,” Dad says, and Dean leans forward, braces his hands against the corners of the countertop.

_C’mon Sammy, keep your damn mouth shut_

Sammy straightens up, already so damn tall it floors Dean into silence sometimes. His little brother is built big, not an ounce of unnecessary fat lingering on those faux-child bones.

“It’s not killing them,” Sam says, his voice wavering in the no-man’s land of puberty. Dean groans silently and stiffens his back.

Dad’s jaw settles into a neat line and Dean bends his bad knee enough to loosen it, should he have to jump in between them. Again.

“It’s feeding,” Sammy continues, self-preservation a logical fallacy. “It hunts at night, and they’re not dying yet.” Sammy’s voice is firm and Dean clears his throat before Dad can follow through on the clear threat in his eyes.

“Sam. Shut the hell up. They’re not dyin’ yet but they will be, soon as the Nightmare finishes draining ‘em,” Dean says. Sam’s spine pops with the reprimand; kid’s never handled criticism well, but he keeps his mouth shut, and that’s only out of deference to Dean.

“Dad, you don’t need him and you know it.” Dean’s mouth carves strangely over the words; he’s clumsy when talking to his father like this and he feels like it’s painfully obvious.

John makes a weird sound in the back of his throat and Dean cuts his eyes over to Sammy, gasps coming in at around 52 per minute, four-thirteen sets, and that’s still too fast for Dean’s liking.

“He’s got a research paper,” Dean says with finality, and that’s directed at both of them. Dean crosses his arms across his chest and Sam’s down to 26, deeper breaths than before; he’s trying.

“I just meant that we had time,” Sammy says helplessly, and Dean looks hard at his little brother, follows the rubber band-strain of Sam’s features.

“I didn’t--I didn’t mean it like that.” Sam twists his mouth and picks at the faded him of his t-shirt, one of Dean’s old ones, an ACDC Dean actually likes too much but Sammy likes better.

Dean knows he didn’t; Sammy wouldn’t hurt anyone for anything, but he’s thirteen and he wants, and he’s understandably tired of going without.

Dean doesn’t quite catch what Sammy’s after, what he thinks he’s gonna find, because there’s nothing really out here besides this.

Dean ends up going alone, drives the Impala behind Dad’s Ford and he shakes Sam by the waist on his way out, demands that he call three times a day for the next four--one extra on Sunday for completion.

-

You can’t move three nights later.

There’s an anvil charred up and resting heavy in the dip between your lock-ribs and you’re so goddamned scared you can’t breathe.

Dad’s near you, but he’s out like a light.

He’d be up and moving in an instant if you could move your right arm, if you could lash out or take a loud gasp of air.

Instead your eyes won’t open and there’s a slideshow, cinematic reel playing against skin and you’re probably crying.

Sammy, age seven, skinned knees and he’s by himself, you’re across town with Dad because you’re both speeding, trying to get back but the Black Dog was bigger than you remembered, and there was so much death.

Sam’s bleeding out, little knees frost-red and trembling, small mouth open wide on a sob and you watch him waste away before you, trickle of flesh from blood from vein from bone and you can’t scream it away.

Sammy, age five, dark-hungry and growing; you find him shoving scraps of paper in his mouth in the bathroom; he locked the door because even then he was smart enough to not want you looking.

Sammy, right now, holed up in that one room motel right off the Interstate, Chemistry book settled around his ice-princess limbs.

Sam’s there one second and gone the next, and you hear It for what you pray is the very last time.

It nettles, and, as of right now; it’s louder than it’s ever been, like a blanket swarm of sound. You can see it, for the first time.

It’s never been something you thought might be tangible, but in here, trapped in your own head; it is.

It’s violent, and it’s always had a hint of malevolence, but the sound was always tempered by something better, warmer.

Right now it’s untapped malignancy, and the Nightmare _screams,_ curls in on itself and everything happens at once.

Your eyes shutter open and you’re hyperventilating and Dad’s finally awake, sawed off already hooked around his arm like chasity, but you can see the thing and you can feel it dying.

It’s effervescent, shadow-thief, and its eyes are caverns that lead into the gape of its mouth, home of serrated teeth and horrible truth.

Its claws are still carving up your chest, twisting you up with Sammy-memory and failure and _you can’t stop crying_

It shreds itself to pieces before Dad can get his sight accurate enough to aim.

-

Dean calls Sammy the next morning; registers that Sam’s called him twenty-six times.

He knows that Sammy called in two sets and it soothes something in him that he’ll never have a name for.

He’ll never get himself back, and Dad looks grateful that they’re riding in separate cars; he claps a hand on the back of Dean’s neck and brings Dean’s forehead close to his own.

“None of it was real,” Dad says, and Dean flinches when Dad’s fingers dig into the soft of Dean’s neck, press in around the hair that’s growing out from the last time he had a shape-up.

“Sammy’s fine. I talked to ‘im,” Dad continues, and Dean’s nodding because that’s what needs to happen right now.

“People are gettin’ better,” Dad says, and Dean senses that this part isn’t so much for him. “You see what happened exactly, son?” Dad says, and Dean colors under the scrutiny.

“S’like it exploded,” Dean says, and he’s numb, box-brittle.

“Hurt like a bitch,” Dean mutters; he’s a little uncomfortable with this much prolonged attention from his Dad; is it supposed to ache like this?

_told me I let Sammy die I let him bleed out made him hungry and do you know about the Sound_

His Dad nods and pulls back; Dean arches toward the warmth of his father’s palm and winces in shame.

“I’m gonna hang tight here, see if I can’t figure out if the damn thing’s gone for real,” his Dad muses, and Dean’s already nodding, fingers clicking against the keys in his pocket.

“Tell him I’ll be back in a week,” Dad says, and Dean hates the sound of his voice, the flint-drag of it when Dad talks about Sammy.

His Dad’s shoulders cripple in on themselves and Dean wonders if it weighs on his Dad the same as him, if his father feels the breakneck pace of it.

“Tell him I love him,” Dad says, and he’s not facing Dean when he commands it.

-

The next time you hear it Sam’s sixteen and it paints a picture in your head for the very first time.

This one is different than before, because they’ve all felt uncontrollable up until now, like the Sound didn’t mean to crawl in and leak into the wine-cellar of your mind.

It’s _strong_ this time, not the indomitable assault from the Nightmare, but more in the sense that it has become cognizant of what it is; what it does.

It lances through your body like cancer, doubling you over Carmen Hardwick’s supple-wet body with a tremble.

You see it in your head, and it’s loud, it’s telling you NO without saying a damn word and you can’t do anything about it.

There’s fire licking at your brain and you can see it stretch out, farmland of brutality.

You’re screaming because it hurts, and Sammy’s in the house; he can’t see you like this. Carmen is curled in on herself, your shirt is pressed against her breasts and you just wanted to touch but the Sound leaches all your strength.

It’s Sammy who bursts down the door, throws his heavy arms across your shoulders and the Sound clicks off like the end of a radio program.

“Dean, Dean, Dean,” Sammy chants, and he pulls your face close to his collarbone.

His heart counts at two sets of sixteen and one half, perfectly steady and even against your ear.

-

The worst thing Dean’s ever done is let him go.

Dean drives him to the station and his eyes are burning like disease and Dean’s banging away at the steering wheel with a beat that’s not playing.

There’s no sound from Sam beside him; his boy has one hand sprawled against his leg, thick and brawny.

Sam’s taller than him now, hanging over top of Dean’s bowed head with a penance.

Sam gets out first.

Dean’s trembling when he exits on his side; he needs a drink. He’s gonna need too many drinks to drown the taste of rejection, to remember how broken Dean’s own father looked.

“I’ll send you some cash, once a week, on Mondays,” Dean says; it’s hard to look over top Sammy’s head. Sam’s face blocks out everything else.

“Gotta call me when you get there so I can get your address,” Dean continues. Sammy’s staring at him hard but Dean can’t look the kid in the face.

“Dean,” Sam says, and there’s nothing gentle in the way Sammy’s tongue curls around the flavor of his name.

“Don’t,” Dean says tightly, and he looks up and up to meet Sam’s eyes.

It’s a mistake because he sees Sammy, age five, uneven count-beat, all the skin melted from his smooth-boy body.

He finds his boy, crippled and breathless against the earth and he can’t quite catch his shudder in time.

Sam’s hands curl around the lapel of Dad’s jacket and then they’re spinning in place; Sam slamming Dean so hard against the slick-shine exterior of the Impala that Dean worries they’ve broken something.

Sam’s mouth tastes bitter; that’s not what Dean thinks the sweetness of his little brother should be like. There’s a hint of Jack and some mint and then malignancy, underneath the rest.

Dean’s mouth falls open under the plunder and then he takes two fists and shoves Sam back so hard his little brother has to brace those tree-log legs against the concrete.

“Goddamnit. God fucking damnit Sam,” Dean hisses; he’ll never rid his mouth of the taste and now Sam’s made him have to learn to breathe around it?

“That it?” Dean says, and when he grins Sam stands up straighter; he’s fortifying himself.

“That how you wanna play it?” Dean says. “You gonna hang around here if I bend over and play bitch-boy for you?” Dean’s getting loud but he doesn’t care because the kid’s leaving and why doesn’t Dean’s brother understand?

Sam’s face turns so ugly that Dean is appalled, but he holds firm.

“Okay, okay,” Dean says, and his throat locks up against the sluice of desperation he feels leaking out.

“Here?” Dean asks, hands shaking so hard as he jerks his belt loose, clips his fingers on the metal catch.

Sam’s vibrating in place; he’s so livid, and Dean can’t help the ugly smirk his face takes on.

“How you want me?” Dean repeats, and when the formless wail begins; he doesn’t know this will be the last time he hears it for a long, long time.

-

The Sound makes a Technicolor reappearance once, in four years.

You’re on a bender, Dad’s cut you loose with a one-armed hug and a smattering of coordinates and you’re fifteen pounds lighter than you should be because whiskey takes everything and holds nothing back.

You’re ass up across a pool-table and there’s too-long-of-a-second gap between you bending over and the guy unbuckling his pants.

You feel the Sound before you hear it; it makes you laugh, wild and uncoordinated; it thinks it can hurt you after all this time?

Your fuck-buddy falters at your mania, even though you crane your neck back and behind you through your tears because he’s still staring at the reddened swell of your ass like a man come back from War.

You’re waiting for the pain to reverberate through you; so you can grab hold of it, but it swarms within your consciousness and it doesn’t ignite.

You can’t say the same for the guy behind you, faceless, tall and dark-haired, hands weathered and tan against your spine.

You watch his eyes turn black and then claret and then they puddle out of his sockets and leave twin cavities behind.

Whatever else happens to him must be too much to express because the man you were about to fuck chokes and gurgles once, twice and then he crumples to the floor with a smack so loud you hear some of his bones crack.

You’re laughing and crying and your ass is freezing but you can’t move up from your after-hours liaison in this bar you get plastered in all the time.

The Sound mellows into something less painful, less urgent than it’s always been before, and your hips lurch forward when you hear something beyond the glass-splinter echo of it.

_Dean._

It’s the first time it says your name.

-

You’re counting the seconds in four increments; you can’t keep taking Sammy’s age and twisting your perceptions of time around it, but four is stable.

Four is between the two of you and it’s something that won’t change (Sammy’ll keep aging, you think, but you don’t know how wrong you’re yet to become)

You’re sitting in the car with your fists balled by your sides and the cassette is poised and ready; Sam likes Marillion even if that’s a little soft for your tastes.

You just need to get out of your damn car and go inside.

He’s got a girl in there with sexy-ass legs, almost as tall as Sammy; a shit ton of friends who come over to smoke and drink until Sammy kindly kicks them all out to study.

You don’t have a brother and you can’t find your Dad and you can’t fix any of this by hiding in this black coffin.

You welcome the Sound; when it comes.

-

Dean’s psyching himself up, nudges his door open and closes it softly behind him; Sammy’s a hunter; Dean can’t expect to get past him very easily.

Dean reaches up to his neck and shoves the amulet down underneath his collar. He glances around the neighborhood once, cracks his knuckles in the dead air of night.

The Sound is still ringing in his ears and then it abruptly stops, but for the first time it doesn’t disappear with the lack of volume.

Dean can still feel it, roiling around in his head; the added presence of _other,_ and then he hears something within it.

 _Come on in, big brother,_ It says, and Dean pauses mid-step and squints ahead to Sammy’s porch; roar of punch-drunk blood in his veins.

_I missed you._

 


	2. Chapter 2

It’s loud.

First shapeless thought in your empty-head is that it’s loud.

Your brother takes up all your space and oxygen and he’s shameless about it, hands tucked into sweatpants pockets, stomach exposed.

You watch him watch you. 

He’s relaxed in a way you’ve never seen and it sits angrily inside; it lurches uncomfortably and you are stagnant.

“Dad hasn’t been home in a few days.”

It’s your brother who speaks.

-

Sam doesn’t look like he’s exactly cornered. Dean had been prepared to fight little brother, tooth and nail, quick elbow to the temple to disorient him.

Dean had never expected his brother to grow out and wide, hair clipped shorter than Dean remembers it from when they were kids, boyish-innocence.

Sam’s dimples peek around sun-shade corners and Dean wants to reach up, finger the indentation and will Sammy tell him if it still feels the same?

Does Sammy still sleep on his left side? Always the left because the right is counter-balanced? 

Does Sammy pinch his own nose in the middle of the night if he wakes himself up with a snore?

Sammy still remember the blood-on-blood clash of lips and skin, hot metal death-ride? Can Sammy still taste exhaust or has he left it alone; Dean’s burden?

Dean’ll contain it, no matter whether Sam meant it so or not.

Sam leans against the doorjamb in his own apartment, four condensed walls.

Sam has a map of Middle-Earth running the length of the living room; Dean can make it out in the darkness. Darkness holds semi-light unless it’s absolute, and Dean’s never forgotten.

Sam thinks he doesn’t remember but he does. Bilbo and the lot, The Hobbit, the eye that blinks lessers into invisibility and grants them a taste of what they never knew but now only crave.

The One Ring hisses like The Sound, Dean thinks. It must pulsate and beat separate and now Dean can hear Sam’s voice within it (despite it)?

“The door, Jess,” Sam says, and Dean listens by proxy as another door clicks shut, a reluctant finality.

“What the fuck was that?” Dean says, and it erupts; he’s not in control.

Sam doesn’t say anything, not for a long second, and then Dean hears a  _ clickclick  _ and then the howling begins, distant and elusive.

Dean’s knees buckle on sense memory and Sam wraps one arm around his waist.

Dean’s laughing; he can feel the gurgle but he can’t hear himself, and then it’s like Moses. There’s a split in the Sound, a reckoning.

The waves splash apart with a violence that doesn’t come from Dean. 

It’s Sam; he knocks the Sound loose and lowers the volume, tendril of backdrop within which Sammy speaks; Dean’s brother hums.

_ I said I missed you. _

Dean jerks away, good to see he’s still in control of that aspect of himself, and Sam allows it.

“Wanna cut me open?” Sam asks, and he’s holding out his naked wrist, palm up.

“C’mon,” Sam presses, “you can throw salt in the wound, too.” Dean trips as he rights himself and he realizes that the Sound is still trickling away, faucet-drip rather than waterfall.

It’s dangling on the edge of his periphery and that frightens Dean more than the onslaught.

“You’re Sam,” Dean says; drained.

“You sure ‘bout that?” Sam says, and his smile is just as exhausted, dagger-cut of his cheekbones. Dean nods because there’s no other response, and his brother makes Sound and Fury arise out of nothing.

“How do you know?” Sam questions, and he bypasses Dean to go straight to his kitchen, small and inhospitable.

Sam can’t cook worth shit.

Burns water so well it’s purified.

Dean spies the clock in the corner, stainless and twisted-wire. The seconds roll by and Dean divides them into the familiar four, and he realizes that he’d stopped.

Sometime in between Sammy kissing him and this moment; he’d ceased.

The count is great and terrible in its return and the second hand taunts Dean, for an instant; it moves too fast to be caught. 

Dean remembers there are fifteen sets of four in sixty and that’s fine. That’ll remain.

Dean’s tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth, twenty-six to Sam’s twenty-two; when did his brother swallow him whole?

“Hey,” Sam says, and his voice sounds fond, sounds lost.

Dean stretches out four fingers by accident and tugs on them one by one until his heartbeat aligns.

“When I was seven,” Dean says, eyes roaming the spice rack floating above their heads; what does Sammy need with cumin, anyway?

“It was quiet. Didn’t mean anything, not yet.” Dean nods to himself and when he looks up his brother is blinking wide and his face is devoid.

“I was three.” Sammy says it plainly and it hurts Dean to nod, yes, you were three and tiny and you slept locked up in my side?

“Did it hurt.” Sammy’s questions sound like responses and it makes Dean crazy, makes his heart skip six and then he’s got to re-count, begin anew.

“No.” Dean says, and he steps closer but that whisper becomes a nudge and Dean’s eyes fly shut in shock and anticipation.

“You were a fucking kid.” Dean says, and he won’t (can’t) open his eyes.

Sam relents.

-

Your brother sleeps in the living room with you. He curls up on the floor beside you, arms pillowed behind his head.

He doesn’t say anything but his breathing is even and his chest is flat; you can’t unsee that.

You want to talk about how you’ve been living and hunting alone, nothing but you and the Baby; your Siren-call.

You tell him to go to bed; Jess hasn’t seen him all night. 

He doesn’t call you out on the knowing of her name, but he doesn’t smile-shy either, not like he used to. 

He stands; his breathing’s changed.

He fucking shoves you down onto the couch, ass first and then you’re back up, the spar that you were meant to have that you narrowly avoided.

Sam’s lithe, muscle over bone over muscle-blood. He laughs once, and that heats your veins, it thrums in your ears in a war-march  _ one, two, threefour  _ and you swing with the pattern.

You catch your brother just on the undercut of his jaw and he staggers, head snapped so hard to the side you hear the crack.

You’re satisfied; you may not know what this is but you know Sammy; you know your body and your little brother might be built large but he hasn’t been bloodied and homeless for awhile.

The Sound pulsates at an indeterminable speed; first you are upright and then your knees smack faux-wood and you’re saying his name in four two-sets, SammySammy, SammySammy.

There’s a commotion and Sam’s trying to talk to you,  _ in between  _ the Sound, like before, but it’s cacophonous.

Blonde flits past your vision, you think  _ Mary _ and you hate yourself. You are not the weakest link.

You’re hunched over so far you can’t hear yourself; you’re a memory of what you once were.

The Sound shudders off, not a resounding click and more like a drain, and when you finally stand, Jess is there, wild-haireyes.

Her arms cross protectively over her ample chest and her nose is bleeding.

She doesn’t look afraid.

-

“You ain’t even know what it was, not at first,” Dean says, and Sam blinks blearily over coffee.

Sam used to take his lukewarm, honey-browned by hazelnut creamer and five sugar packets, but now he drinks it scalding, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

It must sizzle the roof of his mouth, char it to bits and ash, and Dean nurses his own. 

This coffee shop reeks of affluence, there are freshly ground beans from somewhere in the Himalayas (Dean’s probably making that one up, but still).

Stanford’s colors are splashed lazily on the walls, Picasso-abstract, just enough so that you’ll never be allowed to forget your happy home.

Sam’s spine is rucked in his seat and Dean’s Dad’s jacket is slumped over on Sam’s couch where Jessica’ll probably see it and know.

There’s a bloodstain on it.

Dean doesn’t want to look at it.

Dean raises his mug and sips delicately. It’s still scorching and he resists the urge to blow a cooling breath over top. Sammy’ll never let him live it down.

“I didn’t know.” Sammy repeats dumbly, and Dean’s getting real sick of that bullshit.

“Yeah, Sam,” Dean spits. “You didn’t know you could bleed mind rain, or whatever the fuck it is you’re doin.’”

Dean’s hands tighten around ceramic and he keeps his gaze down.

“I know this is--this is some fucking Shining-type shit, but that ain’t on you.” Sam makes a small noise but it doesn’t sound disbelieving. It sounds more melancholy than anything else and Dean shoves the liquid away in disdain.

“That’s why’m here, Sammy,” Dean starts, and he’s tripping over his own tongue, attentive.

Sam’s suddenly upright, spine barely kissing the back of his chair, and he pushes his own empty mug next to Dean’s.

Dean glances down, watches the humdrum rhythm of Sam’s fingers; is he bracketing his fours in four-sets for Dean’s benefit?

Dean counts, eyes unwavering for a necessary second. By the time his Spidey-senses are tingling, Sam’s already smiling, carnivorous.

Dean feels the presence before he turns around, and only Sam’s miscount, falter of his nails catches Dean off-guard.

“One hand, s’all I need,” Sam says pleasantly, and when Dean makes to turn around the Sound makes an appearance, hard nudge in his mind.

It locks Dean forward, and Dean sees it for the second time in his life, directly after the Nightmare.

It’s dark-wisp thin and effervescent; he follows the trail towards Sam’s being. Dean wonders if everyone else can see it--but he doesn’t think that Sam means to show it. He thinks it might be out of Sam’s realm of control.

It looks like smoke, intangible, but it works like tentacles. Dean can hear It, It dips over his body, passes  _ through  _ and Dean shudders, watches the mist.

The cups are rattling.

“See,” Sam says, “here’s where I tell you not to touch him; you do it anyway because you know him, right?”

Dean’s back stiffens ugly and he does turn. The man’s face is familiar; the way you remember pregnancy, amputation.

“One black eye not enough?” Dean counters, because, fuck this. He’s not sitting like Sam’s just gonna handle it. Not when Dean’s got a right hook like disease and the burning desire to spread it.

One-two swing. Onetwothreefour swing. Threefour swing. Dean divides it and it’s almost even. 

Sam glances at him abruptly, and something feral twists. Dean claps his hands over his ears in reflex; Sound’s howling and everyone in the shop is on their knees, genuflection of horror.

Black Eye is still on his feet, and Dean can sense that’s more due to Sam’s will than any inner fortitude.

“Go on,” Sammy says; his eyes are dark and there’s a fringe of something around the pupil; Dean’s not close enough to examine.

“Apologize,” Sam says, and the Sound pierces through Dean’s head, drags him upright, almost gentle.

“Jesus motherfucking Christ,” Black Eye says, and when Dean looks at him, his eyes are onyx, down to the whites.

He sounds terrified.

Dean’s legs clench together on instinct. He should.

“I’m sorry, fuck, man, I’m fucking  _ sorry!” _

The Sound stutters to a halt. It’s not off; Dean can hear the phantom hum but he doubts the patrons of the coffeehouse are as adept as he is.

They rise, en masse, most bloody, and Dean squints; they’ve got crimson leaking from ear-shells.

Sam’s head flits in the direction of the commotion and It flickers back to life. The doors lock in unison and Dean follows the black snake of power as it divides itself into increasingly smaller tendrils.

The Sound-tentacles shove everyone back down to the ground and remain fluttering, night-bright and silent.

Dean can’t see his brother.

“Thanks for that,” Sam says; he’s so far off.

The Sound ratchets up and Dean ducks low. He can hear shattered glass and then there’s a scream, human, in the midst of the chalkboard screech Sam’s creating.

Dean looks up and he watches, open-mouthed, as the ebony of the man’s eyes spreads, leaks from his eyes to travel across his face, inked-veins.

Black Eye’s mouth falls open and the veins slither inside.

They’re merely a product of the Sound, manifestation of will. The veins criss-cross and then the Sound hits a sweet note and Black Eye’s body begins to levitate; Sam’s standing motionless.

Black Eye coughs up his own blood.

It’s black and viscous and he doesn’t move; he’s stretched out in a cross in the air. 

Sam hangs him suspended long after the veins have painted themselves across every spare inch of skin in a brand.

Sam allows the man to clatter to the floor and the Sound is still wailing, but it’s on a steady, continuous note.

“Dean,” Sammy says, and Dean can’t even find his voice.

“Wait outside.” 

Dean’s already shaking his head. “Fuck all that, man,” Dean says; he’s livid.

“What the fuck is this, huh? Sam?” Dean’s already walking closer but he meets the Sound head on. It turns his body mid-step and shoves him to the door; he’s got no external control of his limbs.

He doesn’t realize he’s the only one screaming until he’s huddled on concrete and the coffeehouse has gone silent.

-

Your brother is a murderer.

You know it sure; you watched it happen.

Your brother is the Sound you’ve been hearing all your life.

He is the reason you were sure you were insane; that you would never measure up, faulty Winchester chain.

Your brother can destroy you with a single noise. 

Your brother has evolved.

You watch him; he’s driving, hunched over the wheel because you can’t, your eyes dart from road to windshield to him, and you want to scream but you get the sense that you can’t; he won’t allow it.

“M’not gonna hurt you,” he says, and it’s weary.

You get that, you do, but he’s already done it before. Who’s to say he won’t try again.

“If I didn’t know you,” your voice is not your own and it speaks without permission. “I’d wanna hunt you.”

Your brother’s face is hollow and when he curls one hand around the heat of your neck, you don’t dare flinch.

-

“Sam.” Dean says, and he sidesteps his little brother as Sam makes his way to the kitchen, slams cabinets open.

“Sammy,” Dean tries again, different tack, and Sam’s shoulders slump.

“You couldn’t kill me if you tried,” Sam says; his voice is plain and clear.

“Dad wouldn’t know where to start,” Sammy adds, and Dean follows his brother around the counter, bumps his hip against the knob of a drawer.

“M’not--Jesus, Sam, I’m not gonna fucking kill you!” Dean yells.

Sam leans back, folds those long arms across his chest and smirks. “Why not?” Sam pauses. “I’d make a good hunt; Dean.”

Dean raises his eyebrows. 

“Sorry Bonnie; this show don’t make sense without you in it,” Dean says. “What the fuck m’I gonna go around killing my kid brother for?”

Sam reaches for a butcher knife, dislodges it from its carrying case and slaps it down with an audible clang.

“I killed that guy in front of you, right?” Sam asks. Dean’s not about to answer that, but Sam bulldozes ahead, next statement.

“Everyone in that place is dead too,” he muses, “which really fucking sucks because I always drink there before Macro.”

Dean reels backwards; he doesn’t mean to, honest, and Sam’s eyes shimmer with that undefinable quality.

“Why’d you--” Dean says, and he grits his jaw; he’s not a fucking pussy, god damnit. “Why’d you kill him. The first guy.”

The one who started this; he doesn’t say.

Sam’s jaw ticks warningly and he replaces the knife, slams the cabinet with a bang. Is Jess sleeping?

Sam avoids the spice rack with practice borne out of habit and he flicks the room into darkness, casual knock of the light switch.

Sheer curtains hang over the only window in the living room, red afterglow, and Dean squints at the black-box television set in the corner.

There are plants on either side and that comforts Dean in some unexplainable way.

“You always gotta have answers you aren’t ready for,” Sam says. He’s facing away from Dean, toward that stoplight glow and Dean’s never been more scared in his life.

“That’s you Hawking,” Dean says; it falls flat.

“He knew what you looked like on your back,” Sam says, so calm-dry that Dean’s own heart is about to splatter his ribcage.

“He wanted to see it again,” Sam continues. 

Dean doesn’t know how Sam can know that, how Sam can know about any of it, but he does. Dean sees that clearly now.

Dean remembers the Sound, one time in four years, a pool table and cavern eyes.

Sam’s never not known.

“That’s--” Dean says; his voice is gruff. “That’s fucked up Sammy.” Dean steps closer.

Sam doesn’t answer but his lips quirk.

-

“Dad’s hunting the thing that killed mom,” Dean says.

It’s another dark night and they’re investigating Clarks Coffee--it’s, “unlike anything they’ve ever seen before.”

Jess makes herself scarce and Dean wonders about that; what are they?

Sam looks up over his Poli-Sci book and smiles, so bright and tinfoil shiny that Dean wants to curl up in Sammy and just breathe. One second.

“Well then,” Sammy drawls, “guess we better hop to it, then.”

Sam stands, book flopping closed and Dean taps four times, one set of one each to combat the way that Sam’s rummaging in his closet.

“Christ Sammy; it’s not a fucking joke!” Dean’s angry because this is Mom. This isn’t about either of them.

“Good thing I’m not laughing,” Sam says, head buried deep and Dean wants to break something. Preferably his little brother’s nose.

“Careful, Dean,” Dean hears, and the Sound upticks, trickles into his lungs and for a horrifying second Dean doesn’t hear a thing, but he can’t breathe.

“S’loud as I want it to be,” Sam says. He’s shrugging a jacket on and he’s grinning but his eyes are so quiet.

“Practice makes perfect, right Deano?” Sam says, and Dean’s lunging so quick that Sam doesn’t have the chance for a recovery.

Dean takes him down neat; Sam’s back to the wood, and Sam’s eyes darken infinitesimally and Dean screams.

“Fight fair, you fucker, such a goddamned bitch--” Dean grits out. The Sound snaps off and then they’re rolling, Sam hovered over top of Dean.

“I am fighting fair,” Sam breathes, hardly out of breath. 

“You’re not dead,” Sam says, and Dean trembles, just once. 

Sam leans lower, licks at the shell of Dean’s ear and Dean’s hips seize, against his will. His face darkens to a blood-flush and he makes to push Sam away but his brother holds firm.

“Thought you were over this shit,” Dean says lightly.

“Still got your gears all fucked up?” Dean pokes, and Sam’s eyes are hooded, obsidian peeping forth.

Sam doesn’t move when he next speaks; doesn’t bother turning his head. Dean’s heartbeat runs at four sets of four a minute and Sam is heavy between his hole-legs.

Dean blinks.

The ring around his little brother’s eyes is red.

“Jess,” Sam says.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no worries; I'm not ending it here (I just love cliffhangers).


	3. Chapter 3

“Sam,” Jess says, and Dean’s not breathing underneath little brother, thighs splayed to contain Sam’s brawn.

He’s sick over what this looks like.

“Sam, you gotta let him go,” Jess says, and, whoa; Dean’s not expecting that.

“Sam,” Jess repeats, and it’s louder, desperate. Dean angles his head so he can see her better, and his view is crooked, sideways.

She’s wearing boots and some kind of sundress, pink, Dean thinks.

Her hair is hanging loose around her face, thick ringlets of silk that she’s tying up even as she speaks.

“Sammy,” she says, and Sam’s head whips to face hers so quickly that Dean almost reaches up to check whether or not Sam’s got whiplash.

“You love me, right?” Sam says, eyes focused on her; Dean might as well not even be there. Dean arches up into Sam’s chest, just enough for leverage.

Sam’s running burnt; his body has enveloped Dean entirely.

“Sam,” Jess says; is that the only word she knows? Dean’s brother’s name, all jagged in her whore-mouth? Dean’s heart is about to gallop out of his chest.

“You know--you know I love you.” Her voice runs pale and Dean knows the Sound of it, the air-gasp. Dean turns his head back to his brother’s, all thoughts of escape forgotten.

“Hey,” Dean says, “hey, Sammy.”

Sam’s still facing Jess, arms hovering over-top Dean, bridge of Sam.

“Like you mean it, Jess,” Sam cajoles; his voice is honey-in-your-mouth sweet.

“I--I love you,” she repeats, confused and growing; she’s stepping closer.

“Why?” Sam asks; he still hasn’t moved and Dean’s too frightened to make the motion for him. Whatever dance Sam’s at is a fragile one, and Dean won’t forgive himself if it goes awry.

Everyone’s safe like this, Dean motionless and compliant under his brother.

“Ever since we met, you bought me a new coffee when I was the one who spilled mine on you,” Jess says. Her voice sounds strange, tinny, and Dean darts his gaze between her eyes and Sam’s jaw-line.

“Say it again,” Sam says complacently. “Make me believe it.”

“I love you,” Jess says, helpless, and she makes eye contact with Dean for the first time. Dean recoils from the fanaticism in her eyes, bright-hungry and shiny. Dean must make some kind of noise because Sam turns back down to face him, full attention.

“I let you up, you gonna behave?” Sam says. Dean nods; he needs all his limbs if he’s about to take his brother down.

Sam rolls off and to the left, that much closer to Jess.

Dean sits up, deceptively slow, and Sammy’s watching Jess when Dean gets his knees underneath him.

Dean lunges, off-balance, before he’s fully upright. Sam won’t expect Dean to give him the upper-hand like that, and Dean’s gonna need the element of surprise. He gets the feeling that nothing really throws Sam for a loop anymore.

Sam crumples heavily; his right leg gives out on him as he takes all of Dean’s unexpected weight. Dean threw his body while he was still in a half-crouch, and that’s his undoing.

Sam spins with barely a grunt; Dean saddled on his back.

“That’s what I fucking get,” Sam breathes, elbowing Dean loose with a mean-spirited jab to his ribs. “Can’t keep a promise any better’n he could.”

Dean grunts at the impact and falls free, toppling to the floor. 

“Let him go, Sam,” Jess tries again, and she steps closer to Dean, hot glisten of her eyes. Dean doesn’t like it. There’s nothing about her gaze that he can stand, and she knows it.

“Hold it,” Sam says. There’s no mirth left in his voice and Dean feels the echo of It before he hears the noise. 

“Fuck,” he mutters, accustomed to invasive pain, the abrasion of something omniscient hovering inside your head.

It washes around and over him, curls of black circling until they find Jess, envelope of smoke.

“You don’t touch him,” Sam says, one tendril snakes out and curls about her wrist, easy. Jess glances down and back up, pink mouth parted on a cry.

“You love me,” Sam says; she’s nodding vigorously, her face is wet and the vines of the Sound are louder, tremulous. Dean’s ears verge on ache.

“Sammy,” he says, and his brother doesn’t turn to face him, won’t acknowledge Dean’s voice in the stance of his body.

“I woulda listened to you,” Sam says. He tilts his head to the left and Dean recoils from the red ring of his little brother’s eyes.

“You think I’d ever hurt him?”

The Sound coils around her other wrist and jerks her arms apart, cross-hung horizontal. Dean wobbles up to his knees and It inches up in volume, knocks him back down so that he’s balanced on one.

“Don’t you dare act like him,” Sam says calmly, and Dean knows that’s meant for him.

“Saving people?” Dean grits out; Sam hasn’t shut off his voice-box, then. “Doin’ the right thing for people who don’t--” Sam’s back trembles and the noise is amplified. Dean’s fingers dampen and he smells the rust-familiar of his own blood.

He thinks he could probably pick his own sample out of a lineup.

“They can’t fucking help themselves, Sammy!” Dean’s back bows forward and he falls. He braces the impact on his hands and his ears are exposed.

Sam’s voice rings clear through the tinhat noise, the clamor for obedience. Dean wonders if Sam allows his voice exposure or whether or not Dean’s just crossed like that.

Would Dean be able to hear his own brother from underneath the cacophony of Hell?

“Not that,” Sam says carefully, and Dean watches the moment crystallize. His brother turns fully to face him and the Sound shudders to a freeze.

Dean’s never seen this before, not in all the years of playing test-dummy for his brother’s preternatural powers.

Dean sits up with a jerk, thumbs carefully at the blood leaking from his ears.

“You okay?” Sam asks, hurrying over to cup Dean’s head in those big hands, palms smearing blood into Dean’s sideburns.

Dean peeks around the horizon of Sam’s shoulders, watches Jessica frozen in terror, hair whipping around sunken cheeks.

The Sound, the physical manifestation of it anyway, is coiled to swing, will-o-the-wisp onyx hanging in innumerable veins above Dean’s head, above even Sam’s.

It looks like the roots of a tree, halted in motion, picture-perfect.

“Did you,” Dean says, “did you know you could do that, Sammy?” 

Sam’s still running his fingers over Dean’s brow, up and around the shell of one earlobe.

“What?” Sam says, distracted. “I’ll finish it,” Sam murmurs, and Dean’s hand comes up to wrap around his little brother’s wrist, thick and corded with muscle.

“Just uh--just pull ‘em back in, Sammy,” Dean says; his smile is slow and tilted; Sam knows.

“Lock ‘em back wherever you keep ‘em.” Dean’s nodding because Sam’s only staring at him, blinks far and few between.

“S’like, you remember the Spiderman comics you used to read?” Dean asks, hopeful in the least.

“We read them together,” Sam says, petulant to the last. 

“Yeah, yeah, guess we did,” Dean says. “Reminds me of Doc Ock,” Dean finishes, and he doesn’t add the part where the good Doc’s own creation became a part of him; ran the show.

Sammy smiles, ghost of the little boy who rattled Dean’s bones from hundreds of miles away, killed a monster with sheer want of Dean’s well-being.

Takes killing a Nightmare to become one, Dean supposes.

“This isn’t your fight,” Sam says, hands slipping from Dean’s cheeks and Dean’s man enough to admit it, he whines, reaches for his brother’s hands back.

“Not another one of us is gonna die,” Sam says and then he’s turning, and Dean’s not fast enough.

The play begins again, sharper definition for having faltered and the tentacles wrap around Jess’ throat and squeeze instantaneously.

Dean doesn’t mind the rattle of Sound; Jessica’s hands struggle to free themselves but they’re locked. 

It’s like deja vu; Dean watches as Sammy lifts her into the air, more gentle levitation than he provided Dean’s fling back at the coffee shop.

“He’s not for  _ you,”  _ Sam says, and Jess’ eyes are blue. Blue like Iowa-sky, like life.

“Sammy!” Dean yells; it’s his Sam’s hurting voice, desperation and command rolled together.

“Since you love me so much,” Sammy says, voice dripping derisively, “then you’ll understand how much I love him.”

Dean feels a pressure beginning at the back of his neck and his head begins to lower without his permission. This is Sammy’s tacit way of ensuring that he averts his gaze.

Dean doesn’t know whether he’s just become better able to think around the chaos of the Sound or Sammy’s allowed something within it to change, but his ears remain unaffected and he listens to Jessica’s last gasp for air.

She says something; it’s garbled, and Dean guesses it doesn’t really matter, not in Sammy’s-end.

Sam switches the Sound off with the same efficiency that he applies to everything else, and although Dean can sense that he has autonomy of his limbs back, he remains kneeling, head bowed, palms flat on Sam’s hardwood floor.

“And Dean,” Dean’s brother says, somewhere far above him.

“They  _ created _ Doc Ock, you remember?” Sam says, pacing quickly. 

“These--they belong to me.”

-

You didn’t speak when your mother lit up against a ceiling backdrop and you find yourself faced with the same dilemma now.

It’s a weak-link in your processing, cognitive error.

Faulty machinery, your father would tell you.

Whatever the case, you can’t speak after your brother performs another Nazarene execution and you don’t understand the why behind it. 

When you think on it later, you’ll realize you had nothing to say.

-

Sam takes twelve steps from living room to dresser and Dean thinks that Sam’s good for angling it in a neat group of four.

Dean’s leg dry-taps against the floor and he’s being foolish about it. He’s seen blood leaked, splattered and splayed like offering.

Jess all curled at his feet, neck bruised pink-violet-blush of her own dress, still wants to ask Sam something.

Sam must’ve loved her, Dean thinks. He loved her enough to show her, let her in, and he never provided Dean a modicum of that.

Sam crams long-legged Levi’s into a single bag and he nudges Dean up with one palm to the small of his back.

“I need to bury her,” Sam says, looks down carefully as if the thought has just occurred to him, the need to make peace with the infernal.

Dean opens his mouth and his voice is shot, raises his fist to punch Sam in the mouth for shutting him down but then he remembers 

_ This is a thing Dean Winchester does _

And he folds fists into palms back into his lap and Sam nods seven times and groups them into one and three-fourths sets and Dean nods once himself to make up the difference.

Sam won’t let him touch to help, even though Dean killed her as sure as Sam did, just by nature of showing up on their doorstep like a night-thief, looking for his Daddy.

Sam cradles her so close that Dean must make some kind of noise because Sam looks down at him, warm and justified like he sees Dean’s closet-spaces.

“M’not a monster,” Sam says; his hand is so wide that it covers the entire expanse of Jessica’s head; her broken neck would loll otherwise.

“I loved her,” Sam says, “she meant--she was important. To me,” he adds, and Dean finds himself nodding, what else is he supposed to do?

Sam carries her out of sight, back into the bedroom, and Dean wants to follow but he also wants to stay right here, crouched on his brother’s floor.

Sam comes back through the entrance empty-handed, but his face has neutralized and Dean can’t follow the pendulum of his brother’s emotions.

“I’m gonna torch it,” Sam explains, and Dean scrambles to knees and then feet, yanks hard on his brother’s wrist and jerks him close.

Dean’s voice wobbles and rebels, but his intent is clear. 

_ You will not burn her up like fucking trash, Sam, you will not make this house her grave. _

But Sam is great and terrible and oh so many things that Dean has been taught to love and his brother smiles down at him, dimple poking harmlessly through his cheek.

“They can’t find her buried and me gone,” Sam explains, like Dean’s stupid and doesn’t get why; Sam’s always been pragmatic, just not at the expense of others, always himself.

Dean hauls his fist back and it explodes against Sam’s sternum, frisson of impact that knocks Sammy back a step or two.

Dean’s brother shakes off the blow and when he looks up, he’s still smiling but his eyes are glistening and Dean wants gone.

“We gotta go,” Sam explains, palms upward in supplication. “We gotta--we need to find Dad, so we gotta leave.”

Sam straightens his back and his t-shirt and Dean counts his steps one by one and screams internally when Sam takes one extra and sixteen becomes seventeen.

Dean’s heart stutters at five groups of four sets and he gnaws so hard on the inside of his jaw that blood leaks sluggishly onto his tongue.

Smells like gasoline, sickly sweet like burning sugar cane and Dean knows Sam’s made it so they can’t tell it’s arson; they might figure it out anyway.

Sam jogs out of the room, crinkle of flame behind him, grabs Dean and bag in that order and propels Dean ahead of him to the front door.

The Impala is a dull gleam outside and all Dean can see is his own complicity.

There’s a penny on the ground and Dean’s steps falter as he thinks about picking it up. Pennies are the best of change, so easy to manipulate into whatever you need them to be.

He leaves it in lieu of Sam.

“Hunting things, huh?” Sam says breathlessly; his cheeks are apple-flushed and he’s alive, backdrop of smoke and crematorium behind him.

Dean drives.

-

Your brother notices that you can’twon’t speak with him, and in true Sam fashion, he doesn’t press it. 

He phrases his questions as yes or no and takes your non-words as law.

Your mind is quiet.

It’s a Sam-full place, but Your Sam grins wide and he still hunches his shoulders a fraction of an inch to give you the necessary illusion that you are bigger than him, better equipped to protect him.

Sam’s too world-wide to allow you to protect him from himself.

Your Sam still frames your face with callused hands and your teeth clack together when he kisses you, honeyed-sun in your mouth.

But this Sam is Your Sam and he cups one hand around the nape of your neck even though you cringe and it sticks-thick to your ribs.

This Sam picks a motel and raises a brow to see if you’re okay with it (you don’t give a shit) and you turn in.

This Sam bleeds you dry.

-

Sam knows people.

Dean’s confused about the turn of events because Sam’s not supposed to have  _ connections. _

Sam’s at Stanford and he’s supposed to be rolling in his high-brow education with a girl that looks like Mom and smells cooked, like Mom, too.

Sammy can manipulate the world around him into death-by-Sound and he’s clean with it.

Dean’s little brother smiles little-boy bright and Heaven help him, Dean loves him for it.

Sam knows a girl just outside Palo Alto who wears shorts about three inches long and legs that look made for hanging ‘round Sammy’s forearms.

Sam blushes pretty when she slings both arms around his neck and drags him down several inches for a hug.

She’s tall, for a girl, not as tall as Jess but Jess isn’t as tall as Jess anymore so who gives a fuck, and she squeals so happily that Dean claps Sam on the back on an afterthought.

Sam’s face is hum-red and Dean wants to laugh but his throat wouldn’t allow it.

Sammy, who massacres dozens and murders for sport. Big-little brother, all torn up over a little PDA.

Legs ushers them inside, her name is Diane-call-me-Di, and she curls those sticks up under a peach of an ass and asks Sammy how he’s been.

Sam ducks his head and motions to Dean, “this is my brother, Dean,” Sam says, and Di’s eyes widen fractionally.

“Who the--Jesus fucking Christ, Sam, you pick him out of a catalog?” 

Sam leans back, smirk curling around his lips like smoke.

Dean coughs in surprise at the response and his head flits from Di to Sam in confused amusement. 

Dean ducks his own head and snorts. No need to write a book on his looks. He’s read that story firsthand.

“Nah; that’s just his face,” Sam jokes, and Dean pops his shoulder half-heartedly. 

Wants to make a quip about her slim legs so bad it almost pushes through his self-imposed barrier but the Sound explodes into being and Dean grunts at the white-burn of pain behind his eyelids.

It’s gone just as suddenly and Dean wonders if Sam’s got telepathy too, or he’s just that transparent to his brother.

“We need fakes,” Sam says, very serious, and Di tangles her fingers in the bottom of that oversized T-shirt.

“How soon?” she says, smile still playing at the corners of her mouth, but Sam’s transcended that. 

“Soon as you can, before anybody else in line,” Sam says, and Di’s mouth downturns. 

“Awh, Sammy,” she wheedles; Dean’s knee bounces against his closed fist.

“You know summer’s coming up, gotta give me some advance notice, babe,” Di says, and she’s staring at Sam with come-fuck-me-eyes and Sam’s blinking passively.

“Soon,” Sam repeats, and Dean’s thighs lock together at the Sound-whine, floating just above their heads. 

Di swipes at her ears like it’s a plague she can get rid of.

Sam’s index jerks.

“Fuck, you hear that?” Di asks, hands curled over her ears in distaste. Dean wants to laugh hysterically, tell her that if it’s still in the realm of ‘hear,’ rather than oppression, Sam’s merciful today.

“I’ll call you tomorrow, be back in two days,” Sam says, and Di’s face is scrunched; she nods under duress.

The Sound tapers quiet and then Sam drags her into a hug, uses that murder-palm to crush her head to his pec.

Dean gives his brother a dry look over Di’s head,  _ she’s probably wettin’ her thong right now _

Sam’s dimples come out to play and Dean nods goodbye.

-

Two and a half weeks later, God reassembles your tongue and Sam’s got both palms flat on the table before him as he scrounges through Dad’s journal, looking for what you probably missed.

“You loved her so much,” you ask, and Sam looks up, nightwing-tilt of his stained eyes, and you want him safe so desperate it makes your heart trip involuntarily.

There’s a gentle clang that hisses into the back of your mind, and you know, in some ways; the Sound is an extension of Sam’s emotions; It embodies them.

“You killed her,” you add unnecessarily. 

Sam’s mouth is flat and he crosses his arms.

“She knew about this--’bout you, so don’t gimme any bullshit.” 

You knows your line is hard and fast, but so is your younger brother.

“She didn’t know about you,” Sam says carefully, index slicked up and waiting to flip the page. “Better to save her from that.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> once again, silverspecialshoutout bc my girl helps me publish things that have been sitting in dank, airless rooms, and I have nothing but the utmost respect for her.


	4. Chapter 4

You don’t sleep after that. 

It’s not a conscious decision, anymore than the loss of your feelings and your voice but your brother is heady and he drives you numb.

He tells you; he says, “Dean, I don’t kill without reason,” like that’s supposed to assuage the every-day guilt of allowing your desecrated brother to breathe.

_ You’ll always provide him with air, so this is a moot point _

But he hasn’t murdered; the Sound hovers on the cliff-edge but it doesn’t cross and your brother works hard to maintain the boundary.

He looks at you, over diner-menus and takeout trays; his eyes are so young, fragile with that first hint of free youth and you need to keep that.

His eyes roam free and you allow it, because Sam’s a Winchester and he always makes the most of what he’s been given.

-

Sam drives the second leg to Westchester and Dean allows it because Sam’s got a plan that Dean’s not yet privy to.

Dean opens his legs and taps two fingers against his thigh and Sammy’s humming The Battle of Evermore so things could be a lot worse.

Sam’s slicked-up heartbeat trails at six four sets and Dean knows he’s anticipatory but, to what end?

Di’s number is still floating on the dash in the sun, weathered by the sting-ray of light and Sam’s new fake is eating up space in his wallet.

Dean’s got one too that deliberately does not list him as Sam Winchester’s Big Brother and Dean drags the flat of his index against the ridge of it, separate but equal.

Sam’s hand batters the wheel; he’s off-beat at the best of times and Dean’s never been able to correct the oversight, but he leans his head back and grins wide into Dean’s face.

“Glad I made you buy that other jacket, huh?” Sam says, loud over the music that he nor Dean refuse to adjust.

Dean grunts underneath his third layer but Sammy’s right. It’s cold and only gonna get worse from here, especially since Sam’s breaking the cardinal rule and driving them further north when the temperature is steadily dropping.

“Bout as glad as I would be if you decided to share what’s goin’ on with the class,” Dean says, and Sam laughs, hard-low thing and turns to the left.

“Here to see the Moores,” Sam supplies, and the luminance of his face peters and out and Dean swallows rust.

“Wh-what the fuck, man?” Dean says, sitting upright even though his seatbelt knocks him back into a slouch.

“Fuck are we about to do here,” Dean says, and Led’s screaming, drowning out anything besides.

“Hey, Mr. and Mrs. Moore, sorry to trouble you at this dark point in your lives,” Dean spits, and for the first time he opens his mind wide and screams for Sam’s  _ thing  _ to come at him, consume.

The Sound hums a bit; Sam’s heartbeat, and Dean screws his eyes up as his brother slows to thirty.

“But we wanted to come’n apologize real personal for your loss,” Dean says, and Sam takes a hard right, sends Dean’s shoulder knocking into the window.

Dean slaps a palm over the glass-connection and turns more than halfway in his seat to face his little brother.

“We were there when she died,” Dean shoves on, “matter’a fact, I stood right there and watched when Sammy strung her up like Christmas lights, made her bleed from her mouth--” Dean says, and The Sound is a whisper, rather than a roar.

It tightens around Dean’s neck, and Dean knows he can feel them even if he can’t touch.

They’re thicker than normal and there are only three, languishing above Sam’s head, weapons at the ready.

One snakes forward, sinuous, and knocks Dean backwards so that his spine connects with the seat. It’s like a double-belt and Dean finds that he can’t turn his neck to face his brother.

“Is it better like this, Sammy,” Dean rasps, It flexes at this throat but he can still scrawl out some words for his brother to overhear.

“Truth was always too ugly for you,” Dean spits, and his legs thrum with excitement when they finally pull over; the Chevy idles to the side of the road even though Dean can only face forward and seethe.

“We’re here,” Sam says, voice gun-metal soft and suddenly Dean can breathe again, constriction-free.

Sam gets out of the car first, slams the door as carefully as he’s been taught, and Dean’s free fingers curl up on his lap, slightly misshapen from broken bones, discolored from his most recent altercation.

The cold seeps in as soon as Sammy rips his door wide, and Dean almost tumbles out sideways.

“Taking you to meet the family, Dean,” Sammy says, and there’s something thick in his voice, sounds a bit like pain but Dean doesn’t wanna hear it.

“Idn’t that what you wanted?” Sam continues, and Dean finally looks up and up, meets his little brother’s blank earth-moss eyes.

Sam extends a hand and Dean takes it, callus to sand and Sam pulls him upright.

The Sound is perfectly in tune between the two of them.

-

Sam’s taken aback by Jessica’s mother, and Dean can tell.

Dean stiffens beside his brother and he resists the urge to grab his hand in solidarity.

Mrs. Moore blinks up carefully, hair twist-tangled down her back, and she reaches one hand out for Sam’s. Sam recovers in typical Winchester fashion, even dead know air, and Mrs. Moore’s eyes collect.

“Sam--Sam, Jesus, Greg, GREG!” She yells, and her nails are digging into Sam’s nut-brown skin and Dean’s standing there like an interloper, one boot unlaced beneath him.

Sam sways in place with the tumultuousness of her grip and Dean wants to steady his brother but It’s chirping away underneath Sam’s skin, millions of fire ants running and nipping at uncovered flesh.

Mrs. Moore is openly crying now, and it’s wild, her makeup slithers down both cheeks and she’s wearing a sweater dress that hangs in ways it’s not meant, bent around turntable bones.

Sam does not retract his hand.

Greg comes to the rescue, face flushed from exertion. Mr. Moore is an inch shorter than Sam and he tilts his chin back a fraction to meet Dean’s brother’s eyes.

Sam bends consciously and Mrs. Moore shoves her other hand into his palm.

“Greg; it’s Sam. It’s her Sammy,” Mrs. Moore bends double in her excitement but Greg looks perturbed; like he’s seen a ghost.

Dean steps closer to his brother but when Greg finally looks like he’s about to speak Sam ducks his head low.

The Sound has tapered off into nothingness and Dean feels at his ears subconsciously, worms his fingers underneath his own hair.

“I’ve been with my brother,” Sam explains, mouth thick over the words. “Our Dad’s been sick,” Sam says cautiously, “for a real long time, and my brother--this is him; this is Dean,” Sam says, and Dean nods slow and Sam’s hand swallows Mrs. Moore whole.

“He came, he came to school to get me. My Dad wants to see the both of us.” Sam’s mouth quirks up in a half smile and Dean reads the wrinkles beside his eyes, the hunch of his back.

Sam’s always been the better liar. They expect degeneracy from Dean and so he delivers, but Sam’s sunshine and white-bread. He’s All-American in that way They crave and Dean wants to stand in shade of the sun.

“I need to tell you that I’m sorry.”

Mrs. Moore attempts to drag him forward, into the house, but Sam locks his knees and the Sound trickles in on a high whine that sounds like a buzz.

“I wasn’t there for her, and that was wrong of me,” Sam says, and Mrs. Moore is shaking her head and she’s freed one hand to cover her mouth and Dean clasps both hands together before him.

“Sam. Sam,” She says, but Sam shudders once and Dean can feel the Sound unlatch before he can think beyond it.

“Sammy--” Dean says warningly, and Greg turns slow to look at him. 

Dean knows it reads wrong but he’s not about to be worried about how it looks when Sam’s ratcheting up into the nether region.

“She meant a lot to me,” Sam continues, “and I loved her very much.” Dean grabs Sam’s forearm, it looks more like a restraint than a caring gesture but Sam’s permitting it to raise in volume and Greg winces under the onslaught.

“Leigh,” he says, eyes crinkled with bruise and agony; how was Dean not paying attention to the signs?

“Let him go, Leigh,” Greg repeats, and Leigh turns from Sam to face her husband. 

“You don’t wanna know what she last said?” Leigh says, voice rising in competition with a Sound she can’t hear or chooses to ignore.

“Boy’s not here for that,” Greg says stiffly and Sam’s hair is tumbled down over his slanted cheekbones; he’s staring so hard at Leigh’s profile that he may as well be made of marble.

“He feels guilty,” Greg says, and Dean swings his attention fully, begs with his eyes for Mr. Moore to have the self-preservation his daughter drowned without.

“Coming all the way up here, to get you riled up about our girl--my little girl,” Greg says, voice honey-thick and waning, all high-tremble like Mr. Moore doesn’t know where to go from here.

“When he can’t change a goddamn thing.” Greg’s eyes flash white and Dean’s already two steps closer to the man than he’d meant to be.

He’s gotta look up; Mr. Moore is closer to Sam’s height than his own but Sam’s standing up straighter and Dean’s ears prickle with the intensity.

Leigh’s wailing.

“You came here for absolution, Sam,” Greg says, and now he just sounds sorry; he sounds pitiful and lost and Dean admires the way he hands his life off, absence of want.

Sam’s hand tightens around Leigh’s and the whites of her knuckles stand out, pale-rot. 

“You’re a fucking idiot, man,” Dean says, and Greg’s face remains motionless. 

“Kid’s 22; he comes down here cause his girl’s dead,” Dean says, “probably the love of his life, and he wants to--he wants to, I don’t know, commiserate over that, and you fuck him up worse?!”

Dean’s livid, and the Sound is sharp and sweet behind his eyelids, bruising and free.

“You got every right to be hurting, Mr. Moore,” Dean grits out, “but you leave him the fuck alone, so help me God--”

Dean slides to the left because Greg’s telegraphing his intent, knees bent and locked, hands raised to move Leigh from in between Dean and himself.

Sam’s staring at Dean like he’s never seen his brother before and then he tilts his head to the side consideringly.

“That’s not an option,” Sam says abruptly, and Greg’s body falters and jerks to a halt. 

Dean’s head comes back online and he realizes that It’s defcon five loud and the Moore’s glass shatters and Leigh’s got a coil of Sound wrapped around her neck so she’s immobilized, eyes unblinking, trained on Sam’s face.

“I can forgive just about anything,” Sam says, fine edge in his tone, “but never that.”

Dean knows he was about to rip Greg Moore limb from limb, salt and burn his memory, but now Greg’s gone and dug himself a Sam-grave and Dean can’t stop his brother, moreover, he doesn’t know if he wants to.

The tentacles pass around and through him; he shivers at the non-contact. 

They twist around Greg’s neck and his spine and lift, tightening at Sam’s command. Greg loses color immediately, heavy bleed of crimson from flushed cheeks, exposes the roadmap of veins hovering just below flesh.

“No more to say?” Sam teases; his smile is Colgate-crisp and Dean squints at his brother, heart thumping into stillness.

“To me? ‘Bout me? My brother?” Sam questions, and the tendrils leak down into Greg’s mouth and spread free, snaking underneath the petal-thin sheaf of skin to disguise themselves among Greg’s capillaries.

Leigh’s face spills color and It knocks her to the side, smacks her spine up against her own doorframe and Dean’s laugh tumbles out dry; they’re gonna murder her husband on her own front porch.

“Sammy,” Dean says, voice brittle and leaf-loose. “You didn’t come here for this,” Dean says, but his brother’s head tilts to the side and clotted black tumbles from Greg’s mouth to travel down his chin and settle in the hollow of his throat.

“Sammy!” Dean says, and the Sound resonates and Dean bows slightly at the waist.

“This--this is the fucking easy way out, Sam,” Dean says, eyes soldered shut against the pain, the sawing of his ears.

Sam doesn’t answer but Greg’s body bows backwards, bridge of his spine, and It crests and mingles with the sound of vertebrae snapping like popcorn.

Greg’s arms fall limply to his sides, they starfish out like the beach and his face is covered in liquid diamond; the family resemblance is shocking.

Leigh’s motionless, and Sam smiles down at her, there’s water in his smile but not his eyes and Dean’s brother trembles fine, lances through his body like illness.

“You loved her,” Sam says mournfully, and Dean hates that his brother means it, that his brother feels every ache he allows to color his tone, “but you wouldn’t have understood what she was becoming.”

Leigh’s held onto Sam the entire time and he leaves her his left hand, raises his right to curl around her cheek. 

His jaw twitches and Dean’s still hunched but his head is turned to the side and his brother’s face groans with the weight of his guilt.

It’s gone just as quickly as it appeared and Leigh opens her mouth but it’s only to drag in air and Sam permits her life to drift out of existence, sudden in its gradual decline.

Her eyes are corn-fed, bright and luminous and Dean knows his brother didn’t drive all the way out here to kill his girlfriend’s family but there’s a crunch of leftover snow on the ground and Jessica lived in a four-story home with a tennis court and there are two more left dead by Sammy’s will.

Greg’s body is free of the invasion, but there’s still black sewage coagulating in his mouth and on his chest; his eyes are open and blind.

Leigh’s face is contorted in anguish but Dean understands that Sam didn’t hurt her. There was no malignancy in the Sound when she died, the bastard of understanding, her silent eulogy.

Sam releases her palm and the tendrils lower her to the ground, leave her half sitting against her open door, proximity to the violence of her husband’s murder.

Dean rises to his full height and follows the numerous line of them, whipcord thin, hovering silently above and around his brother; Sam, head downturned to face his ruin.

“She wouldn’t have lived through losing them both,” Sam says, and he’s looking down on Leigh like he’s seeing Christmas past, like his behind and present are wheat and chaff and Sam’s suffering. Probably more so than Dean ever could.

“You God now, huh?” Dean says, because he’s gonna say it at some point and he might as well get it out of the way.

Sam turns away from the carnage and Dean follows because he has no place left to be but beside his brother.

“You know what it’s like?” Sam asks, and he tosses Dean the keys and Dean breathes in the scent of his childhood along with rusted air and frost.

Sam closes the door more quietly than he needs to and she purrs to life under them, metal dirge.

“It’s like--like they know before I do. Like they get it,” Sam says, and Dean looks back over his shoulder and thinks it looks like a horror movie postcard, the kind you mail to friends on Halloween for a good laugh.

There’s blue-(black)-blood in the white and Dean understands that there’s something to be said for it, and nothing else at all.

“They’re the better parts of my own head,” Sam says, he’s facing the window and Dean keeps his gaze trained on his little brother at the expense of the road.

“They’re sharper and they know,” Sam says, and his hands come up, cradle his neck and his head and he rocks forward, sharp knees banging against the dashboard.

“Hey, hey, Sammy,” Dean says, and Sam straightens up, Sound-waves summoned into being, cumbersome in the black of Dean’s car, and then It silences itself, dissipates.

“Motel,” Sam says, and Dean bites his tongue.

-

Your brother breaks open a bottle of Heineken and dangles it between spread legs.

There’s one bed in this room and it’s cheaper; but you don't plan on stretching out next to your brother’s six arms and ten legs, leave yourself vulnerable.

Your brother smiles.

The green clinks against his hands and they’re tinged by crimson but you don’t recall Sam touching anything but he’s tarnished all the same.

“C’mere,” Sam says, playful, eyes so bright it chokes you deep to see your brother in there, pulpit-window, stained for your penance.

“You gonna shoot me while I’m down then, Dean?” Sam asks, not drunk but meandering his way and you blink stupid because your brother thinks that you mean to murder him, like that power belongs to you in any way.

“Hey, go to sleep, Sammy,” you say and his dimples peek forth from between that sword of a smile and you kneel before your brother because he’s exhausted but he catches you around the waist, thumbs digging into hipbones that slice too deep.

You try and skitter backwards (you do; you’re weak and your brother is consuming) but your brother holds fast, dull nails rubbing circles in your skin, underneath henley and above the faded boxer-line.

“Sammy,” you say, but it comes out wet; it comes out deranged.

“What’d I, what’d I say about killin’, huh?” You try, and Sam’s smile quirks again but his head is bent and when he glances back up you’re blinded.

Sam’s mouth closes over yours and he tastes like mint and hops and hands flutter over your brother’s body and Sam’s hand closes around the nape of your neck, candied hum in your mouth.

His tongue licks your clean and he drags you so close that your hands catch in his flannel and then he releases before you can knock him back out, sensing your end before you can, the way he always has.

“Told me to stay outta your way,” Sammy answers, and his eyes are liquid-gold.

-

Sam’s awake and beside the phone before Dean’s eyes peel themselves back from his face.

Dean’s body still tingles from where Sam’s legs and palm were splayed across his spine but Sammy’s shirtless, boxers low-falling from his hips, and Dean’s burner phone has buzzed off the nightstand to connect with carpet.

“Sam?” Dean says, confused at first, but then, that phone hasn’t rang in over half a year and his legs are tangled in his sheets.

Sam glances down at Dean, and opens the phone.

The Sound locks Dean to the comforter instantaneously and Dean can’t see the manifestation in the dark but he knows It’s there, everlasting and disorienting.

“Dean’s asleep,” Sam says, voice hardened, and Dean finds he can’t cry out, even as It increases in volume.

“He’s lookin’ right at me,” Sam amends, remorseless as he can only be when talking to their father.

Dean struggles but he’s immobilized and Sam looks down on him with something like fondness.

“I’ll tell him,” Sam says. “We’ll get right on that.”

Dean’s body jolts back under his control, and Sam grins, tameless.

“See you soon, Dad.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Come visit me, brosamigos.tumblr.com
> 
> Also, there will be more; this is a verse. Thank you for reading; shoot me a comment with any thoughts!


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